Rachel Nichols Joins Skip Bayless On FS1’s Undisputed
History just continues to repeat itself over and over again. Rachel Nichols was never going to get blackballed by the media after the Maria Taylor thing. It’s always forgive and forget when it comes to mediocre sports media figures. Rachel Nichols is officially back in the mix for mainstream sports media. The former ESPN host will join Fox Sports as part of the Undisputed program involving Skip Bayless.
John Ourand reported the news for Sports Business Journal. Just a quick heads up, you may not have access to the link. You only get a certain amount of free reads per month. The important stuff is quoted below.
“Rachel Nichols will join FS1 as a regular panelist on the Skip Bayless show “Undisputed,” sources told SBJ. The former ESPN analyst will join former NFL star Richard Sherman and rap star Lil Wayne as panelists on the show starting Aug. 28. Executives overseeing the show currently are deciding between whether to have former NFL stars Michael Irvin or Keyshawn Johnson join the cast of rotating analysts. That decision could come as early as today, sources said. The network plans to add a well-known NBA-focused analyst as that league’s season gets underway, sources said.”
“FS1 has spent the past two months interviewing on-air personalities looking to replace Shannon Sharpe, who left the show earlier this summer. Sharpe and Bayless had been the stars of the show since it launched in 2016. FS1 has opted to bring in a rotating cast of personalities to replace Sharpe, rather than have just one foil for Bayless. Nichols has appeared on a Showtime series called “Headliners” that launched last spring. She will appear on an interview show called “The Rachel Nichols Project” on Monumental Sports Network. Nichols left ESPN in 2021, months after a private phone call was leaked where she complained that ESPN chose Maria Taylor to host “NBA Countdown” instead of her.”
As Ourand notes, Nichols is still doing her gig with Monumental Sports. I have a link for that here if you want more information on that.
It sounds like Richard Sherman will be the primary debate partner for Skip during football season. Lil Wayne will also join the shows on Fridays. Michael Irvin is listed as another possible addition. It remains to be seen what exactly Nichols will do on Undisputed, but it seems as though her role will be more expansive than a normal host that watches Skip argue with a wall while talking nonsense.
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